Systems and methods for syndicating and hosting customized news content

ABSTRACT

A system provides client access to customized news content. The system includes a custom news source server and a news search server. The custom news source server periodically sends one or more customized search queries to a news search server. The news search server fetches news content from multiple news source servers and aggregates the news content. The news search server also periodically receives the one or more search queries from the custom news source server, searches the aggregated news content based on the one or more search queries, and periodically provides selected news content to the custom news server based on results of the searches. The custom news source server permits access to clients, from across a network, to the selected news content provided by the news search server.

RELATED APPLICATION

The present application is a continuation of U.S. patent applicationSer. No. 10/748,661, filed Dec. 31, 2003, which relates to U.S. patentapplication Ser. No. 10/748,663, filed Dec. 31, 2003, the disclosures ofwhich are incorporated by reference herein in their entirety.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present invention relates generally to information aggregationsystems and, more particularly, to systems and methods for hostingcustomized news content aggregated by a news aggregation service.

2. Description of Related Art

Existing news aggregation services (e.g., Google News) search out, andaggregate, news content published on web pages throughout the Internet.In response to a search query from a user, or when a user browses anewspaper section of the news aggregation service, the news aggregationservice presents a list of stories, from the aggregated news content,relevant to the query or to the newspaper section requested, with eachstory involving a group of articles from different publications dealingwith the same topic. To keep abreast of developments in the news, usersmust manually access the news aggregation service, re-enter a searchquery and view relevant news stories.

Accordingly, it would be desirable to implement a news browsing servicethat automatically provides news content to a customer based on receivedcustomer search criteria.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Systems and methods, consistent with the principles of the invention,implement a news browsing service that may use search queries, receivedfrom a remote server that stores custom news documents, toautomatically, and periodically, provide custom news content retrievedfrom a server that aggregates news content to the remote server. Thecustom news content may then be hosted at the remote server and accessedby various users. A customer associated with the remote server maycustomize the content and format of the custom news page.

According to one aspect consistent with the principles of the invention,a method of retrieving news content from a news aggregation serverincludes hosting first news content at a first news server and receivinguser input selecting news content of the first news content. The methodfurther includes sending query data, associated with the selected newscontent, to the news aggregation server and receiving second newscontent from the news aggregation server resulting from a searchperformed at the news aggregation server using the query data. Themethod also includes hosting the second news content, in conjunctionwith the first news content, at the first news server.

According to another aspect, a method of creating custom news documentsincludes periodically producing one or more custom search queriesrelated to news of interest and sending the one or more search queriesat periodic intervals across a network to a news search server thataggregates news from multiple news sources. The method further includesreceiving news content corresponding to the one or more search queriesfrom the news search server and inserting the news content into thecustom news documents. The method also includes permitting access toclients, from across the network, to the custom news documents.

According to a further aspect, a method of providing news content to anexternal server that hosts customized news content includes fetchingnews content from multiple news source servers and aggregating the newscontent. The method further includes periodically receiving one or moresearch queries from the external server and searching the aggregatednews content based on the one or more search queries. The method alsoincludes periodically providing news content to the external serverbased, at least in part, on results of the searches.

According to yet another aspect, a method of retrieving news contentfrom a news server includes permitting client access to first newscontent contained in one or more news documents stored at a customdocument server and sending query data to the news server based, atleast in part, on a portion of the first news content that is accessedby the client. The method further includes receiving second news contentfrom the news server based, at least in part, on the query data andincorporating the second news content into the one or more newsdocuments. The method also includes permitting client access to thesecond news content at the custom document server.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The accompanying drawings, which are incorporated in and constitute apart of this specification, illustrate an embodiment of the inventionand, together with the description, explain the invention. In thedrawings,

FIG. 1 is a diagram of an exemplary network in which systems and methodsconsistent with the principles of the invention may be implemented;

FIG. 2 is an exemplary diagram of a client and/or server of FIG. 1 in animplementation consistent with the principles of the invention;

FIGS. 3A, 3B and 3C are flowcharts of exemplary processing for hosting acustom news page at a news search server according to an implementationconsistent with the principles of the invention;

FIG. 4 is a flowchart of exemplary processing for hosting a custom newspage at a custom news server according to an implementation consistentwith the principles of the invention;

FIGS. 5A and 5B are flowcharts of exemplary processing for custom newsserver related news retrieval according to an implementation consistentwith the principles of the invention;

FIG. 6 is a diagram of an exemplary news aggregation search pageaccording to an implementation consistent with the principles of theinvention; and

FIG. 7 is a diagram of an exemplary custom news page according to animplementation consistent with the principles of the invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The following detailed description of the invention refers to theaccompanying drawings. The same reference numbers in different drawingsmay identify the same or similar elements. Also, the following detaileddescription does not limit the invention.

Systems and methods consistent with the principles of the inventionimplement a news browsing service that uses customer provided searchqueries to automatically, and periodically, provide news content fromnews aggregated at a news aggregation server to one or more custom newsdocuments hosted by the customer at a custom news server. The customermay customize the content and format of the one or more custom newsdocuments and permit access to the custom news document to networkedclients.

A “document,” as the term is used herein, is to be broadly interpretedto include any machine-readable and machine-storable work product. Adocument may include an e-mail, a web site, a file, a combination offiles, one or more files with embedded links to other files, a newsgroup posting, a blog, a web advertisement, etc. In the context of theInternet, a common document is a web page. Web pages often includetextual information and may include embedded information (such as metainformation, images, hyperlinks, etc.) and/or embedded instructions(such as Javascript, etc.).

Exemplary Network Configuration

FIG. 1 is an exemplary diagram of a network 100 in which systems andmethods consistent with the principles of the invention may beimplemented. Network 100 may include multiple clients 110 connected tomultiple servers 120-140 via a network 150. Network 150 may include alocal area network (LAN), a wide area network (WAN), a telephonenetwork, such as the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN), anintranet, the Internet, a memory device, another type of network, or acombination of networks. Two clients 110 and three servers 120-140 havebeen illustrated as connected to network 150 for simplicity. Inpractice, there may be more or fewer clients and servers. Also, in someinstances, a client may perform the functions of a server and a servermay perform the functions of a client.

Clients 110 may include client entities. An entity may be defined as adevice, such as a wireless telephone, a personal computer, a personaldigital assistant (PDA), a laptop, or another type of computation orcommunication device, a thread or process running on one of thesedevices, and/or an object executable by one of these devices. Servers120-140 may include server entities that gather, process, search, and/ormaintain documents in a manner consistent with the principles of theinvention. Clients 110 and servers 120-140 may connect to network 150via wired, wireless, and/or optical connections.

In an implementation consistent with the principles of the invention,news search server 120 may include a search engine 125 usable bycustomers at custom news server(s) 140 and users at clients 110. Newssearch server 120 may implement a news aggregation service by crawling acorpus of news documents (e.g., web pages) hosted on news sourceserver(s) 130 and store information associated with these news documentsin a repository of crawled documents. Server(s) 130 may store ormaintain news documents that may be crawled by server 120. Such newsdocuments may include recently published news stories, or older (i.e.,not recent), archived news stories. Custom news server(s) 140 may offera news browsing service that hosts news documents that includecustomized news content received from news search server 120. Customnews server(s) 140 may additionally host news documents that includenews content prepared by an entity operating custom news server(s) 140.The news content hosted at custom news server(s) 140 may be customizedin accordance with custom search queries provided to news search server120. In some implementations, news search server 120 may host newscontent documents that include news content customized in accordancewith custom search queries provided to news search server 120 fromcustom news server(s) 140. An entity operating custom news server(s) 140may, thus, act as a “customer” of the news aggregation serviceimplemented on news search server 120. Users associated with clients 110may access, via network 150, custom news content stored at custom newsserver(s) 140.

While servers 120-140 are shown as separate entities, it may be possiblefor one or more of servers 120-140 to perform one or more of thefunctions of another one or more of servers 120-140. For example, it maybe possible that two or more of servers 120-140 are implemented as asingle server. It may also be possible for a single one of servers120-140 to be implemented as two or more separate (and possiblydistributed) devices.

Exemplary Client/Server Architecture

FIG. 2 is an exemplary diagram of a client or server entity (hereinaftercalled “client/server entity”), which may correspond to one or more ofclients 110 and servers 120-140, according to an implementationconsistent with the principles of the invention. The client/serverentity may include a bus 210, a processor 220, a main memory 230, a readonly memory (ROM) 240, a storage device 250, one or more input devices260, one or more output devices 270, and a communication interface 280.Bus 210 may include one or more conductors that permit communicationamong the components of the client/server entity.

Processor 220 may include one or more types of conventional processorsor microprocessors that interpret and execute instructions. Main memory230 may include a random access memory (RAM) or another type of dynamicstorage device that stores information and instructions for execution byprocessor 220. ROM 240 may include a conventional ROM device or anothertype of static storage device that stores static information andinstructions for use by processor 220. Storage device 250 may include amagnetic and/or optical recording medium and its corresponding drive.

Input device(s) 260 may include one or more conventional mechanisms thatpermit an operator to input information to the client/server entity,such as a keyboard, a mouse, a pen, voice recognition and/or biometricmechanisms, etc. Output device(s) 270 may include one or moreconventional mechanisms that output information to the operator,including a display, a printer, a speaker, etc. Communication interface280 may include any transceiver-like mechanism that enables theclient/server entity to communicate with other devices and/or systems.For example, communication interface 280 may include mechanisms forcommunicating with another device or system via a network, such asnetwork 150.

As will be described in detail below, the client/server entity,consistent with the principles of the invention, perform certainsearching-related operations. The client/server entity may perform theseoperations in response to processor 220 executing software instructionscontained in a computer-readable medium, such as memory 230. Acomputer-readable medium may be defined as one or more physical orlogical memory devices and/or carrier waves.

The software instructions may be read into memory 230 from anothercomputer-readable medium, such as data storage device 250, or fromanother device via communication interface 280. The softwareinstructions contained in memory 230 may cause processor 220 to performprocesses that will be described later. Alternatively, hardwiredcircuitry may be used in place of or in combination with softwareinstructions to implement processes consistent with the principles ofthe invention. Thus, implementations consistent with the principles ofthe invention are not limited to any specific combination of hardwarecircuitry and software.

Exemplary Processing for Hosting Custom News Page at News Search Server

FIGS. 3A, 3B and 3C are flowcharts of exemplary processing for hosting acustomer's customized news content at news search server 120 accordingto an implementation consistent with the principles of the invention. Inthis implementation, news search server 120 may locally store andmaintain news content for an external entity, associated with customnews server 140, according to search queries provided by the externalentity.

Processing may begin with news search server 120 accessing external newscontent (e.g., from server 130), fetching the news content andaggregating the fetched news content in a local memory (act 305)(FIG.3A). For example, server 120 may use a news crawler (e.g., web robot)that may access news content documents hosted by news source server(s)130. News source server(s) 130 may host, for example, news content fromthe Washington Post, the New York Times, or other news content sites.The fetched news content may then be indexed and grouped, usingconventional indexing and grouping techniques (act 310).

Server 120 may receive one or more search queries from a custom newsserver 140 (e.g., the “customer”) (act 315). A number of forms of searchqueries may be supported by server 120, including the following searchquery forms: (a) one or more keywords (e.g., ‘bush,’ bush iraq,’ etc.);(b) topical categories (e.g., ‘topic=sports,’ ‘topic=sport—basketball’;(c) geographical categories (e.g., ‘geo=usa,’ ‘geo=north america,’‘geo=china’); and/or (d) combinations of the above (e.g., ‘tennistopic=sports’, geo=europe’). For example, a personal “wireless” newssection can be seeded with two queries: ‘wireless topic=science’ and‘cell phone topic=technology.’ An operator of custom news server 140 maycompensate an operator of news search server 120 for hosting newscontent at news search server 120 according to the one or more receivedsearch queries. In one implementation, the operator of news searchserver 120 may be compensated by hosting, and monetizing, advertisementsreceived from the operator of custom news server 140.

Server 120 may determine whether a user, associated with a client 110,has selected the customer's news page hosted at server 120 (act 320).For example, as shown in FIG. 6, a user may “click” on the “Custom News”button 605 of a news search page 600 of a news aggregation serviceassociated with server 120. If the user has selected the customer's newspage, server 120 may then execute one or more queries associated withone or more news sections of the customer's custom news page (act325)(FIG. 3B). Server 120 may execute the one or more search queries tosearch through news content previously aggregated in local memory.Server 120 may then provide a custom news page to the user (act 330) bysending one or more documents to the user containing the customer'scustom news page. The one or more documents may additionally includecontent authored by an operator (e.g., a “blog”) of custom news server140 and previously provided to news search server 120. The customer'scustom news page may be formatted similar to a human-compiled newspaper,with a title, short introduction, related story titles, data, photo,etc. By way of example, FIG. 7 illustrates a personal news page 700 thatincludes two news sections 705 and 710, “California News” and “WorldNews,” respectively. The customer's custom news page may additionally beused to produce a similarly configured print newspaper in a viewable orhard copy format. For example, a postscript or pdf file may be producedthat is portable for viewing and ready to print for offline reading. Inone implementation, the layout of the print newspaper may be separatelyspecified from the custom news page hosted on server 120.

Server 120 may determine whether the customer desires to customize itscustom news page (act 335). If not, processing may continue at act 345.If the customer does desire to customize its custom news page, thenserver 120 may receive input from the customer to customize thecustomer's custom news page (act 345)(FIG. 3C). An interactive program(known as a Wizard) may execute at server 120, or at customer newsserver 140, to walk the customer through the process of adding newssections, placing them appropriately, and customizing their look andfeel.

Customers can customize their custom news page in many ways, includingthe following: (a) adding a new section seeded with new queries; (b)changing the appearance or location of a news section or the queriesassociated with a news section; (c) moving news sections around (e.g.,from top left of news page to bottom right, from 2 columns to 1 columnlayout, etc.); (d) deleting a news section; (e) changing displayproperties for news within a news section (e.g., deciding how manystories the news section should have, how many related titles within astory, whether images should be shown, etc.); and (f) changing rankingproperties within a news section. When changing ranking propertieswithin a news section, the customer may decide how freshness of the newscontent should be valued, such as, for example, sorting news content bytime, by importance, or by some combination, or by providing hints forranking certain types of stories above other stories. Additionally, thecustomer may indicate that a certain kind of news source (e.g., New YorkTimes, sources in USA, etc.) may be preferred or not preferred. Also,the customer may provide general keywords that are of interest to theuser (e.g., San Francisco) and stories with these keywords should beboosted. Further, the customer can list journalists they like or do notlike or genres they like or do not like (e.g., opinion/commentary vs.breaking news vs. briefs vs. full coverage). Those skilled in the artcan devise user interfaces that allow such preferences to be expressedeither in the context of one particular news section, or all sectionstogether.

Server 120 may access external news content (e.g., from server 130),fetch updated news content and aggregate the updated news content inlocal memory (act 345). For example, server 120 may use a news crawler(e.g., web robot) that may access updated news content documents hostedby news source server(s) 130. The fetched updated news content may beindexed and grouped, using conventional indexing and grouping techniques(act 350). Server 120 may then, periodically, execute a query(ies)associated with one or more news sections of the customer's custom newspage (act 355). Processing may then return to act 320 (FIG. 3A) todetermine if a user has again selected the customer's custom news pageto view updated, customized news content.

Exemplary Processing for Hosting Custom News Page at Custom News Server

FIG. 4 is a flowchart of exemplary processing for receiving customizednews content from news search server 120 and hosting the news content atcustom news server 140 according to an implementation consistent withthe principles of the invention. In this implementation, custom newsserver 140 may locally store news content received from news searchserver 120 based on search queries provided by custom news server 140 tonews search server 120.

Processing may begin with custom news server 140 producing one or moresearch queries associated with one or more news sections (act 405)(FIG.4). The produced search queries may be related to news content that anoperator of customer news server 140 desires to host on custom newsserver 140. Custom news server 140 may then send the one or more queriesto news search server 120 via, for example, network 150 (act 410). Newssearch server 120, upon receipt of the one or more queries, may executeconventional search algorithms using the one or more queries to retrieverelevant news content from aggregated news content stored in localmemory. News search server 120 may send the relevant news content tocustom news server 140 via network 150.

Custom news server 140 may then receive relevant news content resultingfrom an executed search of the one or more queries performed at newssearch server 120 (act 415). Custom news server 140 may populate locallystored news sections with the news content received from news searchserver 120 (act 420). The customer associated with custom news server140 may, thus, create its own “on-line” newspaper by combining externalnews which may come from a set of dynamic queries executed at newssearch server 120 with news content created locally at custom newsserver 140. Such locally created news content may include, for example,an editorial section that may be maintained using “blogging” technology.

The exemplary processing of FIG. 4 may be repeated periodically suchthat news content may be retrieved from news search server 120 usingdynamic search queries to periodically update news content hosted oncustom news server 140.

Exemplary Processing for Custom News Server Related News Retrieval

FIGS. 5A and 5B are flowcharts of exemplary processing for retrievingnews, related to news content locally stored at the custom news server140, from news search server 120 according to an implementationconsistent with the principles of the invention. In the implementationdescribed with respect to FIGS. 5A and 5B, a customer associated withcustom news server 140 may link all or some of its locally created newscontent with related news stored at news search server 120. When a userselects a link on a custom news page of custom news server 140, a searchmay be executed at news search server 120 to retrieve relevant, relatednews content that can be provided to the user.

Processing may begin with custom news server 140 optionally embeddingsearch queries in selected locations of news content documents stored atcustom news server 140 (act 505). For example, HTML Iframes may be usedat custom news server 140 to load one or more dynamic news queries.Custom news server 140 may then determine if a user, associated with aclient 110, has selected news content stored at custom news server 140(act 510). If so, custom news server 140 may send query data to theclient 110 associated with the user (act 515). The query data mayinclude embedded search queries that may, in turn, be provided by client110 to new search server 120. In some implementations, the embeddedsearch queries may be in the form of an “applet” or an “iframe.” Newssearch server 120 may execute a conventional search technique using thesearch queries received from client 110 to retrieve relevant newscontent from aggregated news content stored in local memory. News searchserver 120 may then return the retrieved news content to client 110.

In an alternative implementation, if the user has selected news contentstored at custom news server 140, custom news server 140 may send querydata to news search server 120 (act 520). The query data may includesearch queries that were embedded within the news content selected bythe user. The query data may also include the Uniform Resource Locator(URL), or some of the text, of the news document hosted at custom newsserver 140. Subsequent to receiving the query data, news search server120 may execute a conventional search technique using the query data toretrieve relevant news content from aggregated news content stored inlocal memory and return the retrieved news content to custom news server140.

In one implementation, based on the URL received from custom news server140, news search server 120 may fetch the news document corresponding tothe URL hosted at custom news server 140 and an appropriate query, basedon keywords of the news document, can be generated that can be executedby search engine 125 to find related news content. In anotherimplementation, a suitable query can be devised, based on text given tonews search server 120, which can be executed by search engine 125 toretrieve related news content. In a further implementation, searchengine 125 can provide a ranked list of other news content accessed byusers who accessed the URL sent from custom news server 140. In yetanother implementation, given a URL from custom news server 140, searchengine 125 may locate a group of related news content to which the givenURL belongs. For example, based on a previous grouping of all newssearched on the “web,” news search engine 125 may already have createdgroups of related news content. Based on this previous grouping, searchengine 125 may determine the group of related news content with whichthe given URL has been grouped. The remaining news content in this groupmay then be returned to custom news server 140.

Custom news server 140 may then receive relevant news content resultingfrom the executed search performed at news search server 120 using thequery data (act 525). Custom news server 140 may populate news sectionsof locally stored news documents with relevant news content receivedfrom news search server 120 (act 530)(FIG. 5B).

CONCLUSION

Systems and methods consistent with the principles of the invention mayuse received customer search criteria to automatically, andperiodically, provide custom news content to a remote custom newsserver. The custom news content may, at the custom news server, beintegrated with local news content and provided to clients who desire toaccess the news content via the custom news server.

The foregoing description of preferred embodiments of the presentinvention provides illustration and description, but is not intended tobe exhaustive or to limit the invention to the precise form disclosed.Modifications and variations are possible in light of the aboveteachings or may be acquired from practice of the invention. Forexample, while series of acts have been described with regard to FIGS.3A, 3B, 3C, 4, 5A and 5B, the order of the acts may be modified in otherimplementations consistent with the principles of the invention. Also,non-dependent acts may be performed in parallel.

As one skilled in the art will appreciate, the processing exemplified byFIGS. 3A, 3B, 3C, 4, 5A and 5B can be implemented in software and storedon a computer-readable memory, such as main memory 230, ROM 240 orstorage device 250 of server 120 or server 140, as appropriate.Alternatively, the processing exemplified by FIGS. 3A, 3B, 3C, 4, 5A and5B can be implemented in hardwired circuitry, such as combinationallogic, within server 120 or server 140, as appropriate. It will also beapparent to one of ordinary skill in the art that aspects of theinvention, as described above, may be implemented in many differentforms of software, firmware, and hardware in the implementationsillustrated in the figures. The actual software code or specializedcontrol hardware used to implement aspects consistent with theprinciples of the invention is not limiting of the present invention.Thus, the operation and behavior of the aspects of the invention weredescribed without reference to the specific software code—it beingunderstood that one of ordinary skill in the art would be able to designsoftware and control hardware to implement the aspects based on thedescription herein.

What is claimed is:
 1. A system comprising: one or more computer devicesto: determine, for a particular user, information identifying one ormore of a keyword, a phrase, a topic, or a geographic locationassociated with the particular user; generate, for the particular user,one or more search queries based on the determined information;generate, for the particular user, a custom document that includes aplurality of custom sections; provide, for presentation at a first time,the custom document; embed, in a first custom section of the pluralityof custom sections, query data associated with a first search query fromthe generated one or more search queries, the first search query beingembedded in an applet or iframe; periodically execute the query data;obtain, based on periodically executing the query data, contentresponsive to the query data; populate the first custom section of thecustom document with the content to form a populated document; andprovide, for presentation at a second time, the populated document, thesecond time occurring after the first time.
 2. The system of claim 1,where the one or more computer devices, when determining the informationfor the particular user, are further to: provide an interface thatenables the particular user to provide the information; and receive theinformation from the particular user via the interface.
 3. The system ofclaim 1, where the one or more computer devices are further to:determine preferences associated with the particular user; and modifythe custom document based on the determined preferences.
 4. The systemof claim 3, where the one or more computer devices, when modifying thecustom document, are further to at least one of: modify a position forthe first custom section in the custom document, modify an appearance ofthe first custom section in the custom document, add, in the customdocument, an additional section to the plurality of custom sections,remove, from the custom document, one of the plurality of customsections, modify an appearance of the content in the first customsection, or specify an amount of the content to include in the firstcustom section.
 5. The system of claim 3, where the one or more computerdevices, when modifying the custom document, are further to: modify thequery data embedded in the first custom section to specify at least oneof: one or more sources from which to obtain the content, one or morefiltering criteria to specify a portion of the content to include in thefirst custom section, a ranking criteria to sort the content within thefirst custom section, at least one additional keyword, phrase, topic, orgeographic location to add to the query data, a location from which toobtain the content, or a time period for the content.
 6. The system ofclaim 1, where the one or more computer devices are further to: receivedata from the particular user, and populate a second custom section, ofthe plurality of custom sections, with the data received from theparticular user.
 7. The system of claim 1, where the content includes anadvertisement.
 8. The system of claim 7, where the advertisement isselected based on the query data.
 9. A method comprising: determining,by a processor and for a particular user, information identifying one ormore of a keyword, a phrase, a topic, or a geographic locationassociated with the particular user; generating, by a processor and forthe particular user, one or more search queries based on the determinedinformation; generating, by a processor and for the particular user, acustom document that includes a plurality of custom sections; providing,by a processor and for presentation at a first time, the customdocument; embedding, by a processor and in a first custom section of theplurality of custom sections, query data associated with a first searchquery from the generated one or more search queries, the first searchquery being embedded in an applet or iframe; periodically executing, bya processor, the query data; obtaining, by a processor and based onperiodically executing the query data, content responsive to the querydata; populating, by a processor, the first custom section of the customdocument with the content to form a populated document; and providing,by a processor and for presentation at a second time, the populateddocument, the second time occurring after the first time.
 10. The methodof claim 9, where determining the information for the particular userfurther includes: providing an interface that enables the particularuser to provide the information; and receiving the information from theparticular user via the interface.
 11. The method of claim 9, furthercomprising: determining preferences associated with the particular user;and modifying the custom document based on the determined preferences.12. The method of claim 11, where modifying the custom document furtherincludes at least one of: modifying a position for the first customsection in the custom document, modifying an appearance of the firstcustom section in the custom document, adding, in the custom document,an additional section to the plurality of custom sections, removing,from the custom document, one of the plurality of custom sections,modifying an appearance of the content in the first custom section, orspecifying an amount of the content to include in the first customsection.
 13. The method of claim 11, where modifying the custom documentfurther includes: modifying the query data embedded in the first customsection to specify at least one of: one or more sources from which toobtain the content, one or more filtering criteria to specify a portionof the content to include in the first custom section, a rankingcriteria to sort the content within the first custom section, at leastone additional keyword, phrase, topic, or geographic location to add tothe query data, a location from which to obtain the content, or a timeperiod for the content.
 14. The method of claim 9, further comprising:receiving data from the particular user, and populating a second customsection, of the plurality of custom sections, with the data receivedfrom the particular user.
 15. The method of claim 9, further comprising:receiving a request from another user to access the custom document, andwhere, when obtaining the content, the method includes: obtaining thecontent based on receiving the request.
 16. The method of claim 9, wherethe content includes an advertisement.
 17. The method of claim 16, wherethe advertisement is selected based on the query data.
 18. Anon-transitory computer-readable medium storing instructions, theinstructions comprising: one or more instructions which, when executedby a processor, cause the processor to determine, for a particular user,information identifying one or more of a keyword, a phrase, a topic, ora geographic location associated with the particular user; one or moreinstructions which, when executed by the processor, cause the processorto generate, for the particular user, one or more search queries basedon the determined information; one or more instructions which, whenexecuted by the processor, cause the processor to generate, for theparticular user, a custom document that includes a plurality of customsections; one or more instructions which, when executed by theprocessor, cause the processor to provide, for presentation at a firsttime, the custom document; one or more instructions which, when executedby the processor, cause the processor to embed, in a first customsection of the plurality of custom sections, query data associated witha first search query from the generated one or more search queries, thefirst search query being embedded in an applet or iframe; one or moreinstructions which, when executed by the processor, cause the processorto periodically execute the query data; one or more instructions which,when executed by the processor, cause the processor to obtain, based onperiodically executing the query data, content responsive to the querydata; one or more instructions which, when executed by the processor,cause the processor to populate the first custom section of the customdocument with the content to form a populated document; and one or moreinstructions which, when executed by the processor, cause the processorto provide, for presentation at a second time, the populated document,the second time occurring after the first time.
 19. The non-transitorycomputer-readable medium of claim 18, where one or more instructions todetermine the information for the particular user further include: oneor more instructions to provide an interface that enables the particularuser to provide the information; and one or more instructions to receivethe information from the particular user via the interface.
 20. Thenon-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 18, where theinstructions further include: one or more instructions to determinepreferences associated with the particular user; and one or moreinstructions to modify the custom document based on the determinedpreferences.
 21. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim20, where the one or more instructions to modify the custom documentfurther include at least one of: one or more instructions to modify aposition for the first custom section in the custom document, one ormore instructions to modify an appearance of the first custom section inthe custom document, one or more instructions to add, in the customdocument, an additional section to the plurality of custom sections, oneor more instructions to remove, from the custom document, one of theplurality of custom sections, one or more instructions to modify anappearance of the content in the first custom section, or one or moreinstructions to specify an amount of the content to include in the firstcustom section.
 22. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim20, where the one or more instructions to modify the custom documentfurther include: one or more instructions to modify the query dataembedded in the first custom section to specify at least one of: one ormore sources from which to obtain the content, one or more filteringcriteria to specify a portion of the content to include in the firstcustom section, a ranking criteria to sort the content within the firstcustom section, at least one additional keyword, phrase, topic, orgeographic location to add to the query data, a location from which toobtain the content, or a time period for the content.
 23. Thenon-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 18, where theinstructions further include: one or more instructions to receive datafrom the particular user, and one or more instructions to populate asecond custom section, of the plurality of custom sections, with thedata received from the particular user.
 24. The non-transitorycomputer-readable medium of claim 18, where the instructions furtherinclude: one or more instructions to receive a request from another userto access the custom document, where the one or more instructions toobtain the content include: one or more instructions to obtain thecontent based on receiving the request.
 25. The non-transitorycomputer-readable medium of claim 18, where the one or more instructionsto populate the first custom section include: one or more instructionsto include an advertisement in the custom section.
 26. Thenon-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 25, where the one ormore instructions to include an advertisement in the custom sectioninclude: one or more instructions to identify the advertisement based onthe query data.